INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF TOURISM RESEARCH Int J Tourism Res 13, 401–415 (2011) Published online September 2010 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/jtr.804 Developing Sustainable Rural Tourism Evaluation Indicators Duk-Byeong Park1 and Yoo-Shik Yoon2,* Rural Development Administration, Suwon, Republic of Korea College of Hotel and Tourism, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, Republic of Korea ABSTRACT This study is to develop indicators that measure sustainable rural tourism development within a sustainable framework It was conducted via a Delphi technique and the analytical hierarchy process method After three rounds of discussions, the panel members reached consensus on a set of 33 indicators with four dimensions This set of community-based rural tourism development indicators can serve as a starting point for devising a set of indicators at the local and regional level in order to be useful rural tourism sector manager and administrators The selected indicators are measureable, demand driven and practical to show the real performance in rural destination Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd Keywords: sustainable rural tourism; Delphi technique; analytical hierarchy process (AHP); indicator Received February 2010; Revised 22 July 2010; Accepted 26 July 2010 INTRODUCTION R ural tourism is an economically significant sector of the Korean economy and holds great potential in terms of sustainable rural development Sustainable develop- *Correspondence to: Prof Yoo-Shik Yoon, College of Hotel and Tourism, Kyung Hee University, Heogi-dong, Seoul 130-701, Republic of Korea E-mail: ysyn@khu.ac.kr ment for community tourism should aim to improve the residents’ quality of life by optimizing local economic benefits, protecting the natural and built environment and providing a high-quality experience for visitors (Bramwell and Lane, 1993; McIntyre, 1993; Stabler, 1997; Hall and Lew, 1998; Park et al., 2008; Park and Yoon, 2009) It should come as no surprise that sustainable community tourism has had limited practical application in the areas of management, planning and monitoring systems at the local level (Butler, 1999) Berry and Ladkin (1997) have argued that the relatively small size of most tourist businesses and the dramatic rise of the sustainability issue have raised serious questions about implementing and monitoring sustainable tourism at local levels As in many other countries, in Korea, rural tourism is receiving increased recognition as a rural economic development tool The Korean government has launched 1200 communitybased rural tourism projects since 2002 The government initiatives have sought to encourage tourism as an economic substitute for traditional rural economic activities Although rural tourism accommodations have increased dramatically, government initiatives are not good enough to increase off-farm income for farmers Consequently, Korea has no clearly defined national policies and no strategic reports on sustainable development and its implementation Neither a common management framework nor indicators exist for systematically tracking and monitoring socio-economic and political changes in communities According to Weaver and Lawton (1999), indicator studies in tourism are still in their infancy although the World Tourism Organization (WTO) and other organizations are making sporadic efforts to develop them (Sirakaya Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 402 et al., 2001; WTO, 2003, 2004) If the influence of tourism on all aspects of community life is to be effectively tracked, indicators must be based on policy relevance, analytical soundness and measurability While the dynamic natures and unpredictability of tourism systems have been observed and discussed (Butler, 1980, 1999; McKercher, 1999), little research has been conducted in order to adopt tourism assessment and management tools that account for uncertainty, non-linearity and unexpected changes, such as resilience analysis, adaptive management and system dynamics modeling (Farrell and Twining-Ward, 2004, 2005) Generally, sustainable community tourism should provide a long-term economic linkage between destination communities and industries (Choi and Sirakaya, 2006) It should also minimize the negative effects of tourism on the natural environment and improve the socio-cultural wellbeing of the destination communities Indicators have been identified as desirable instruments and/or measuring rods for assessing and monitoring progress towards sustainable development (Tsaur et al., 2006) Butler (1999) suggests that without measures or indicators for tourism development the use of the term ‘sustainable’ is meaningless and becomes hyperbole and advertising jargon Sustainable tourism indicators (STI) are not only useful in evaluating the actual impact of sustainable tourism development policies for measuring progress; they can also stimulate a learning process to enhance the overall understanding of environmental and social problems, facilitate community capacity building and help to identify sustainable development goals and suitable management strategies (Reed et al., 1996) The purpose of this study is to develop indicators for measuring sustainable rural tourism development (SRTD) within a sustainable framework using a Delphi technique and the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) RURAL TOURISM DEVELOPMENT AND KOREA Research on rural tourism has been a focus of tourism research for many years (Suh and Gartner, 2004), beginning with a focus on the benefits of the industry and evolving through Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd D.-B Park and Y.-S Yoon stages, from ‘advocacy’ (emphasis on economic benefits) to ‘cautionary’ (emphasis on environmental and socio-cultural impacts) to ‘adaptancy’ (emphasis on new tourism models), where new models offered ‘more sensitivity to local needs’ (Jafari, 1988; Gartner, 2004, p 153) During this three-decade transition, an emphasis on the fusion of unspoiled nature and rural life has become increasingly problematic The definition of ‘rural’ (Long, 1998) espoused by Gartner (2004) is ambiguous and includes an emphasis on certain benefits to local, small-scale enterprises and ownership by traditional communities In Korea, it could be argued that social problems define rural tourism: the rapid depopulation of rural areas, the related disproportionate aging of rural populations and reduced rural labor forces and the governmental emphasis on open-market policies for agriculture These problems have caused a stagnation of rural economies and degradation of the general quality of life Unlike the USA, where the rural tourism product is tied to a unique resource base or the transformation of gateway communities into attractions (Gartner, 2004), Korea focuses on strategies that offer farmers opportunities for generating and diversifying revenues The catalyst for rural tourism development in Korea since 2000 has been certain demandbased socio-economic developments, including a higher per capita disposable income, the implementation of a five-day workweek and consequent public investment in rural destination development However, studies on rural tourism have not emerged as rapidly as rural areas have developed; therefore, the specific problems and opportunities for rural tourism have not been adequately evaluated Rural tourism remains firmly positioned as a tool for promoting the development of economically and socially depressed rural areas Recent developments in Korea’s rural tourism sector have largely been driven by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (2002, 2008a, 2008b) Since 2002, two kinds of projects — the Rural Traditional Theme Village (RTTV) and the Green Rural Experience Village (GREV) — have focused on rural tourism development, encouraging local or ‘bottomup’ development and commoditization of local cultural resources Currently, about 1200 rural Int J Tourism Res 13, 401–415 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr Developing Sustainable Rural Tourism Evaluation Indicators communities benefit from government development support under the auspices of the RTTV and GREV and other programs, up from 27 nominees in 2002 and 137 in 2008 (Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, 2008b) In 2009, the number of accommodation units available as tourist accommodation, according to the Rural Development Administration (2009), was estimated to be about 13 000 rooms in 4400 farm-stay households Rural tourism in South Korea is still at an introductory stage: most rural tourists are excursionists with short stays and a low rate of overnight stays (Park, 2009) One of the main problems is that the number of visitors for overnight stays has not increased much, whereas the number of day visitors has increased dramatically (see Figure 1) INDICATORS FOR SUSTAINABLE RURAL TOURISM DEVELOPMENT Over the last two decades, the concept of sustainable tourism development has become almost universally accepted as a desirable and politically appropriate approach to tourism development (Sharpley, 2003) ‘Sustainability’ is a problematic term in tourism research because it is defined in so many different ways (Euracademy Association, 2005; Gallopin, 2007; Stabler and Goodall 1996), and each definition has its own economic, ecological or environmental contexts In tourism, sustainability is largely related to the problem of development and is often defined in terms of the ‘new tourism’ (Hampton, 2005), which focuses on homestays, local foods, handicrafts, small businesses and low-impact transportation (such as the minibuses and horses that are almost 403 synonymous with rural tourism) In the big picture, sustainable tourism is concerned with social justice and economic viability as well as the physical environment (Swarbrooke and Horner, 2004; Mitchell and Hall, 2005) and is simply ‘in a form which can maintain its viability in an area for an indefinite period of time’ (Butler 1993, p 13; Butler 1999) The traditional factors that define sustainable tourism include ‘limits of growth’ in terms of resources, activities and community-based notions of sustainability Sustainable tourism focuses on conservation of environmental and cultural resources and emphasizes the participation of local people and the responsibility of visitors (Mvula, 2001; Wood, 2002) In particular, sustainable rural tourism emphasizes community involvement along with conservation (Ashley and Roe, 1998) The conservation of non-renewable resources is also emphasized, along with the need for locally oriented decision-making processes that are transparent and participatory and that work to ensure that tourism development projects remain sustainable after exterior funding is exhausted (WTO, 2004; Shunnaq et al., 2008) New developmentoriented approaches focus on optimization and the development of new life-cycle models (Lim and Cooper, 2009) In conjunction with developing notions of sustainability and its importance in tourism is a growing number of approaches in the use of indicators for monitoring the progress towards sustainability in tourism development Numerous perspectives on sustainable development in the contexts of agriculture, forestry, community development and tourism have generated their own sets of indicators (Allin Figure Annual number of visitors for day visit and overnight stay Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd Int J Tourism Res 13, 401–415 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr 404 et al., 2001; Miller, 2001; Ceron and Dubois, 2003; WTO, 2003, 2004; Miller and TwiningWard, 2005; Choi and Sirakaya, 2006; Hyde et al., 2007) that differ in terms of their domains and the implications of sustainable development Sustainable tourism development involves conceptual and practical difficulties (Tao and Wall, 2009) that have influenced the often poorly selected range of sustainability indicators (Meadows, 1998), and this in turn has led to serious misinterpretation of assessment results Some of the ‘good indicators’ generally used in tourism research include resonance to target audience, robustness, credibility, sensitivity, availability of data, regularity, costeffectiveness and the lack of ambiguity and comparability (Moldan et al., 1997; Allin et al., 2001; Ceron and Dubois, 2003) In reality, though, it is difficult to find sustainability indicators for the assessment of tourism destinations that actually meet these ideal characteristics (Hughes, 2002; Schianetz and Kavanagh, 2008) According to Hunter and Sur (2007), a better approach to the development of rural tourism sustainability indicators employs increasingly popular multi-method or mixed-method approaches in which any combination of quantitative and qualitative methods lend deeper insight into the research problem In this paper, such an approach is taken, mixing expert-led (top-down) and local stakeholder (bottom-up) approaches (Bell and Morse, 2001) The topdown approach uses explicitly quantitative indicators and acknowledges the complexity of social and ecological perspectives, whereas the bottom-up approach employs a qualitative approach and works to enhance the ongoing collective learning process in the community or tourism destination by defining sustainability goals and priorities within the local context This approach, however, might not necessarily cover all important aspects of, or criterion for, sustainability METHODS Using the Delphi method and the analytical hierarchy process The research described in this paper employs a multi-method approach that includes the Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd D.-B Park and Y.-S Yoon Delphi method and the AHP The Delphi method, a bottom-up, qualitative approach, is used to gather and categorize stakeholders’ attitudes and stated values concerning rural tourism and its effects The AHP, a quantitative approach, is used to evaluate top-down or expert-led perspectives on rural tourism sustainability The Delphi method has been in use over the last thirty years as a method that systematically combines ‘expert knowledge and opinion to arrive at an informed group consensus on a complex problem’ (Donohoe and Needham, 2009, p 416) The method is structured to be a reflexive alternative to focus group interviews and other similar approaches (Needham and de Loe, 1990) The AHP (Saaty, 1980) has also been used for at least thirty years in multiple-criteria decision-making and is a common application for performance evaluation (Hsieh et al., 2008) AHP is popular in tourism planning and tourism destination choice (Chen, 2006; Hsu et al., 2009) It facilitates an approach to understanding decision factors and their relative weight or importance and is useful when used to evaluate expert decision-makers’ expressed preferences or opinions This study used an integrated Delphi-AHP method to identify important factors and their qualitative and quantitative bearing on indicators for evaluating sustainable rural community tourism development in Korea The Delphi method has been used to survey major factors, and the AHP has been utilized to define their significance The Delphi-AHP is applicable to a wide range of complex, multi-criteria decisions that require judgments about qualitative characteristics from a group of panels The evaluation procedure of this study consists of several steps, as shown in Figure First, we collected a series of indicators of SRTD from the literature related to rural tourism contexts, including sustainable rural tourism indicators in Austria, France and Germany Second, the Delphi technique was used to refine and identify the final indicators for SRTD evaluation according to the characteristics of our study case Third, the AHP was applied to calculate the weight of each criterion after the evaluation criteria hierarchy was constructed The evaluation of the SRTD is a Int J Tourism Res 13, 401–415 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr Developing Sustainable Rural Tourism Evaluation Indicators 405 Collect the SRTD Indicators from Literature Review Three Times Delphi Technique (Qualitative) Refine and Identify Indicators for the SRTD Evaluations One Times AHP (Quantitative) Calculate the Weights of the SRTD Indicators Figure Procedure of the sustainable rural tourism development indications complex and comprehensive problem Therefore, the solution requires the most inclusive and flexible method Since the AHP is designed to systematize complicated problems, is easy to implement, and integrates the opinion of multiple experts and stakeholders, it was selected to compute the weights for this study In the main, the AHP weighting was determined by the decision-makers, who conduct pairwise comparisons in order to reveal the relative importance of the criteria Data collection and analysis In this study, the Delphi technique was used in the development of objective indicators for sustainable rural development, a method perceived as a useful starting point for predicting future events based on group consensus (Twining-Ward and Butler, 2002) A similar approach was used to develop the WTO core indicators of sustainable development (Manning, 1999) In the Delphi technique, expert stakeholders’ opinions are recruited and compared (Miller and Twining-Ward, 2005) The panel members who participated in this study were selected in three ways First, 12 sustainable tourism experts recommended the potential panelists, and another list of potential panelists was drawn from an initial list of 25 authors who had published at least one peerreviewed paper on sustainable tourism development in journals in Korea, such as the Journal of Tourism Sciences, Journal of Culture and Tourism Research and Journal of Tourism and Leisure Research Six practical experts involved in tourism development projects sponsored by the Korea Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd (employed variously in central and local government organizations or in local or rural communities as ‘leaders’) were recruited and interviewed for driving measurable indication at the rural community level An additional six panelists were selected from the 168 members of the Korean Rural Tourism Association (Journal of Rural Tourism) The study also employed a snowball sampling using five nationally recognized tourism scholars identified by the Delphi board This snowball sampling approach is a form of purposive sampling (Noth, 1990) in which a structured sample of respondents who are theoretically relevant to the research problem (in this case, rural tourism sustainability) are needed (Brown, 1980) These scholars were asked to provide the names of potential Delphi panel members The list was then cross checked for duplication of names Fifty-four potential panel members were identified and 34 panel members agreed to participate in Delphi (response rate 79.5%) were chosen for the first round of study Consecutive second and third rounds included only original Delphi panel members who agreed to continue sharing their expertise on developing later versions of the rural STI set The number of panel members participating in the second is 34 (response rate 85.7%) and third rounds is 30 (response rate 100.0%) The research instrument used in this study was developed with an informed theoretical outlook coupled with the opinions and comments offered by the Delphi board It consisted of questions divided into three sections focusing on three topics: definitions, principles and potential indicators The panel Int J Tourism Res 13, 401–415 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr 406 D.-B Park and Y.-S Yoon members were asked to form their own definitions and to identify the necessary principles of sustainable tourism Then, based on their individual definitions, panel members were asked to create a list of STI useful in monitoring the progress or problem areas in four key dimensions of rural tourism: service quality, facilities, management systems and outcome Eleven sub-dimensions (categories) were developed These dimensions and the number of indicators for each dimension are listed in Table The results of the first round were categorized and synthesized for use in the second and third rounds The questionnaire was distributed to the second round of Delphi panel members, and there was a response rate of 85.7% Respondents rated their opinion of the statements included in the four key dimensions and 11 sub-dimensions developed in round using a 5-point Likert scale In round 3, a Delphi panel of the remaining respondents completed a questionnaire that was developed to reduce potential biases produced by panel member groupthink Respondents evaluated sustainability indicators in terms of ‘soundness’ (either ‘sound’ or ‘not sound’) Respondents received additional feedback information regarding statistical mean scores and standard deviation for each of the indicators developed for reconsideration after completion of the round survey Following Uysal and Crompton (1985), the comments that were made by respondents were grouped, and where appropriate, turned into questions to establish the depth and strength of opinion relating to that particular issue Respondents were also asked to describe how indicators would be operationalized in practice in the rural tourism context Findings derived from the Delphi study in the form of dimensions and corresponding indicators were further analyzed using the AHP Index weight values were determined using a systematic and hierarchical combination of qualitative and quantitative analyses Equations used in the determination of index weight values (Lifang et al., 2008) helped determine a ‘total-aim’ evaluation model in which an expert panel scores the relative importance of indicators RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Delphi results Thirty-three indicators for four dimensions and 11 sub-dimensions were identified The summaries from the second and third rounds of the Delphi study are shown in Table 2, along with their mean scores, standard deviation, measurability and soundness Each itemized indicator in each dimension has been rated by panel members from strongly agree (5) to strongly disagree (1) After three rounds, the indicators panel members had provided were classified into Table Number of indicators developed from the Delphi study Dimensions Number of indicators developed Service quality Accessibility Convenience 3 Facility Accommodations Subsidiary facilities Environment Management system Community planning Collaborated community business Community management Tourism business 4 Outcome Satisfaction Income and total sales Note: Response rate — round 1: 79.5%; round 2: 85.7%; round 3: 100.0% Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd Int J Tourism Res 13, 401–415 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr Developing Sustainable Rural Tourism Evaluation Indicators 407 Table Indicators for evaluating sustainable rural community tourism Dimension Service quality Category Accessibility Convenience Facility Accommodations Subsidiary facilities Environment Management system Community planning Collaborated community business Community management Tourism business Outcome Satisfaction Income and total sales Indicators Mean SD Soundness Reservation system on homepage Fit tourist guide book and map Equip a directional sign to the village within km Ratio of householders who has checklists for bedding Using credit card for paying a fee Number of people who took lectures on rural tourism 4.43 4.21 4.43 0.94 0.80 0.65 0.92 0.89 0.89 3.62 1.04 0.65 3.71 3.83 1.14 0.94 0.72 0.83 Ratio of rooms isolated from host family house Ratio of rooms with flush toilet Ratio of rooms with shower bath Meeting room with about 20 people capacities Parking lots that hold over 20 cars Refuse disposal system in their community 3.85 1.07 0.85 4.43 4.21 3.52 0.94 0.89 0.95 0.94 0.95 0.65 4.14 3.86 0.77 1.23 0.86 0.76 Long-term community plan for latest three years Fund-raising on their community Number of expert consultation for developing tourism Community festival Ratio of householder with tourism management diary Value-added processing businesses in their community Amount of Internet sales for their own products in their community Minutes and account book for community council meetings Propaganda within latest three years Organizing and participating in local tourism development council Enacting community agreements Ratio of householder participating in community tourism business Full time worker to managing their tourism business Insurance for visitors Constructing customer database 4.43 0.65 0.96 4.29 3.54 0.83 0.97 0.91 0.64 4.00 3.50 0.78 0.94 0.92 0.63 3.71 0.83 0.79 3.86 0.86 0.81 3.93 1.14 0.83 3.71 4.23 0.83 0.83 0.86 0.96 4.07 3.93 1.00 1.00 0.93 0.89 4.00 1.04 0.90 4.00 4.00 0.91 1.04 0.93 0.92 Residents’ satisfaction Visitors’ satisfaction Increasing rate of a number of visitors Increasing rate of direct sales Number of one company one village linkage Ratio of equity capital per government assistance 4.50 4.64 4.36 4.43 3.86 0.76 0.63 0.63 0.76 0.86 0.95 0.97 0.95 0.96 0.85 3.71 0.91 0.83 SD, standard deviation Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd Int J Tourism Res 13, 401–415 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr 408 four dimensions: service quality, facilities, management system and outcome Three rounds of the survey yielded the six indicators for the service quality dimension The panel members heavily favored the ‘accessibility’ and ‘convenience’ sub-dimensions These include ‘reservation system on home page’ and ‘equip a directional sign to the village within five km’ as well as ‘number of people who took lectures on rural tourism’ Panel members reached agreement on six facilities criteria, subdivided into three categories: accommodations, subsidiary facilities and environment Some of the top indicators were ‘ratio of rooms with flush toilet’, ‘ratio rooms with shower bath’ and ‘parking lots that hold over 20 cars’ The ‘management system’ dimension has four categories and produced 15 indicators The ‘community planning’ category had three indicators, including ‘long-term community plan for last three years’ and ‘fund-raising in their community.’ And the ‘community management’ category included four indicators: ‘minutes and account book for community council meetings’, ‘propaganda within last three years’, ‘organizing and participating in local tourism development council’, and ‘enacting community agreements’ AHP results As for the comprehensive principles of tourism development in the rural communities in Korea, we should consider as fully as possible the influencing factors, making the system reflect the true situation D.-B Park and Y.-S Yoon Based on AHP, we divided the evaluation system into four levels The first level is the target layer (i.e the sustainability and measurability of tourism development goals) The second level is the guideline, including four major dimensions: service quality importance, facility importance, management system importance and outcome importance The third level is the sub-dimension (category) that includes 11 specific targets: accessibility, convenience, accommodations, subsidiary facilities, environment, community planning, collaborated community business, community management, tourism business, satisfaction, income and total sales The fourth level comprises the 33 indicators The unified classification of ingredients creates a relative hierarchy and sets the stage for establishing a model tree of total-aim evaluation Service quality importance (B1) The specific meanings of evaluation indicators and standards are as follows Accessibility is divided into ‘reservation system on homepage’, ‘fit tourist guide book and map’, and ‘equip a directional sign to the village within five km’ Convenience is divided into ‘ratio of householders who have checklists for bedding’, ‘using credit card for paying a fee’, and ‘number of people who took lectures on rural tourism’ Facility importance (B2) The specific meanings and standards for the indicators are as follows The facility Figure The Model tree of total-am evaluation Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd Int J Tourism Res 13, 401–415 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr Developing Sustainable Rural Tourism Evaluation Indicators dimension consists of three sub-dimensions: accommodations, subsidiary facilities and environment Accommodation is divided into ‘ratio of rooms isolated from host family house’, ‘ratio of rooms with flush toilet’, and ‘ratio rooms with shower bath’ Subsidiary facilities mean ‘meeting room with about a 20 person capacity’ and ‘parking lots that hold over 20 cars’ Environment means ‘refuse disposal system in their community’ Community management importance (B3) The specific meanings and standards for the indicators are as follows The management system dimension consists of four sub-dimensions: community planning, collaborated community business, community management and tourism business Community planning can be divided into ‘long-term community plan for last three years’, ‘fund-raising in their community’ and ‘amount of expert consultation for developing tourism’ Collaborated community business holds four criteria: ‘community festival’, ‘ratio of householders with tourism management diary’, ‘value-added processing businesses in their community’ and ‘Internet sales for their own products in their community.’ Community management can be divided into ‘minutes and account book for community council meetings’, ‘propaganda within last three years’, ‘organizing and participating in local tourism development council’ and ‘enacting community agreements.’ Tourism business comprises four criteria: ‘ratio of householders participating in community tourism business’, ‘full-time worker to manage their tourism business’, ‘insurance for visitors’ and ‘constructing customer database’ Outcome importance (B4) The specific meanings and standards for the indicators are as follows The outcome dimension consists of two dimensions: income and total sales Satisfaction means ‘residents’ satisfaction’ and ‘visitors’ satisfaction’ Income and total sales are divided into ‘increasing rate of a number of visitors’, ‘increasing rate of direct sales’, ‘number of one company one village linkage’ and ‘ratio of equity capital per government assistance’ Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 409 Weights of indicators for sustaining rural community tourism development According to the results, ‘satisfaction’ has the highest value The weight values of the 33 indicators are more than 0.15, among which ‘visitors’ satisfaction’ has the highest value Also, ‘reservation system on Internet homepage,’ ‘number of people who took lectures on rural tourism’, and ‘residents’ satisfaction’ are higher, which should be given attention during the tourism development of the rural community in Korea There are three indices whose weight values are less than 0.20, including ‘insurance for visitors’, ‘number of one company one village linkage’, (linkage program that one company support for one rural village to visit them and buy agricultural products) and ‘ratio of equity capital per government assistance’ These indicators will be scored from to and used to calculate a final score on a 100-point scale As each stage of tourism development differs from one rural tourism destination to the next, a single set of consistent criteria may not be applicable to the assessment of sustainability in every rural destination On the other hand, some rural destinations may not be able to conveniently offer a comprehensive set of indicator data Miller (2001) noted that resident attitude surveys might facilitate indicators to cope with location differences and enable local input to a standardized set of indicators Similarly, Ap and Crompton (1998) attempt to investigate stakeholders’ perceptions to evaluate sustainability of an ecotourism site based on an indicator Based on the above viewpoints, this paper attempts to use subjective measures to directly investigate residents and stakeholders’ perceptions in the Delphi panel and to add ‘residents’ satisfaction’ to the indicators, thus forming the basis for evaluating sustainable rural community tourism development (Table 3) CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS Indicators are to serve as a guideline for future tourism development at all levels of planning In addition, they are to be tailored in such a way that they clearly reflect the situation of tourism with respect to sustainability while Int J Tourism Res 13, 401–415 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF TOURISM RESEARCH Int J Tourism Res 13, 496–507 (2011) Published online 26 November 2010 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/jtr.823 Exploring Quality of Life Perceptions in Rural Midwestern (USA) Communities: an Application of the Core–Periphery Concept in a Tourism Development Context Charles Chancellor*, Chia-Pin Simon Yu and Shu Tian Cole Department of Recreation, Park, and Tourism Studies, Indiana University Bloomington, Bloomington, Indiana, USA ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION Tourism has increasingly become a preferred option for rural economic development Like other economic opportunities, the purpose is to improve community viability and residents’ quality of life However, the impacts from tourism are sometimes negative and may lead to a decreased quality of life for residents This empirical study investigates residents’ quality of life using the core–periphery (CP) model Periphery respondents reported a statistically higher overall quality of life, which is at odds with other research Significant differences in quality of life scores and subsequent indicators highlight the usefulness of the CP model towards understanding tourism impacts to a rural destination Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd he stakes are high in tourism development — most recognizably for the financiers, but also for the local residents McCool and Martin (1994) stated that the purpose of tourism development, like other economic development strategies, should be to increase the quality of life for local residents However, Rothman (1998) points out that although many communities may initially see tourism as an economic panacea, in some cases it alters the residents’ lives to the point that they report disillusionment and a lower quality of life Residents’ quality of life and satisfaction with tourism is also important for tourism stakeholders Resident dissatisfaction can become a liability for the local tourism industry, which relies on the host society’s hospitality and goodwill (Gursoy et al., 2002) Additionally, to ensure that residents’ dissatisfaction does not become an impediment to a destination’s attractiveness, it is in the interest of tourism stakeholders to identify and understand the host society’s attitudes towards tourism and how it affects residents’ quality of life The connection between residents’ quality of life and tourism impacts is intuitive and has been addressed in the literature d’Amore (1992) wrote that the Tourism Industry Association of Canada addressed the issue in a 1992 annual meeting as members accepted a code of ethics and guidelines that were intended to ‘improve the quality of life within host Keywords: core–periphery model; quality of life; rural tourism development Received 17 June 2010; Revised 12 October 2010; Accepted November 2010 *Correspondence to: Dr Charles Chancellor, Assistant Professor, Department of Recreation, Park, and Tourism Studies, Indiana University Bloomington, Bloomington, IN 47405, USA E-mail: hcchance@indiana.edu T Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd Exploring Quality of Life Perceptions communities’ among other issues (p 65) This move came as a result of the 1987 book Our Common Future also called the Brundtland Report, which was the culmination report of the United Nations Commission on the Environment and Development Empirical research has revealed that in some cases, residents indicated that attracting tourists leads to an increase in residents’ quality of life (Allen et al., 1993; Andereck and Jurowski, 2006) Carmichael (2006) indicated that residents’ quality of life and tourists’ quality of experiences may be influenced by dynamic factors (e.g type and number of tourists, type and number of residents, social exchange relations, social representations and type of tourism development) Lankford and Howard (1994) pointed out that several specific resident-related variables (e.g length of residence, distance of tourism centre from the residents’ home, resident involvement in tourism decision-making) may influence the effect tourism has on residents In a regional development context, the core– periphery (CP) model posits that a core geographic area attracts investment and subsequent development and is the driving force for planning and decision-making The periphery geographic area receives less economic benefit and may become depleted of resources such as labour and capital, which are diverted to support the core area Tourism development could contribute to regional inequality with residents living in the core receiving the vast majority of economic gains and subsequent benefits associated with a higher standard of living (Murphy and Andressen, 1988) Conversely in a tourism context, it is conceivable that residents living in peripheral locations may experience less negative effects since there are fewer tourists in the periphery Determining the spatial distribution of residents’ quality of life, in a tourism development context, could be beneficial to local tourism stakeholders, community leaders and officials A more sophisticated understanding of the relationship between tourism development and residents’ quality of life would allow tourism planners to better mitigate regional issues and residents’ concerns associated with tourism development The CP model provides a framework to systematically investigate the spatial aspect to residents’ quality of life Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 497 This study contributes to building a stronger knowledge base of residents’ quality of life perceptions in a tourism development context, which has been lacking in the literature (Andereck et al., 2007) It also provides empirical evidence to enhance the understanding of the CP concept at a local destination level, in this case rural Orange County, Indiana, USA Much of the previous CP work has been conducted on a global, global region or national scale, and there is a dearth of literature focused on smaller geographic units such as a county THEORETICAL BACKGROUND Tourism impacts and residents’ quality of life Tourism development, like all economic development, comes coupled with a variety of impacts (positive and negative) on the destination, usually articulated in the categories of economic, social-cultural and environmental effects These impacts are often interrelated but are also discussed and studied individually In essence, the study of impacts is focused on how a destination’s local economy, society, culture and natural environment benefit, degenerate or are changed due to tourism Ideally, tourism development provides economic prosperity, leading to a stronger and more stable society and greater environmental awareness, particularly if the natural environment is part of the destination’s image or attraction This ideal situation would also lead to an increased quality of life for the residents However, negative impacts from tourism can lead to a lower quality of life, just as positive impacts can lead to a higher quality of life (Akis et al., 1996) Quality of life is measured as both an objective dimension that is external to the individual and a subjective dimension that reflects individual feelings and perceptions (Andereck and Jurowski, 2006) Researchers indicate that perceived impacts may affect residents’ quality of life more than actual impacts (Bricker et al., 2006) Community quality of life is comprised of residents’ subjective perceptions of a set of objective conditions (Cutter, 1985) Andereck and Jurowski (2006) pointed out that even a comprehensive set of objective measures does Int J Tourism Res 13, 496–507 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr 498 not provide a complete picture without individuals’ subjective evaluation of the conditions The subjective dimension of quality of life provides necessary context since it is emotive, value-laden and encompasses factors such as life satisfaction and feelings of wellbeing (Davidson and Cotter, 1991; Grayson and Young, 1994; Diener and Suh, 1997; Dissart and Deller, 2000; cited in Andereck and Jurowski) Residents have a vested interest that any economic development tool, including tourism development, will improve their quality of life, even if they are not directly employed in the particular industry Additionally, the tourism stakeholders have an interest since the local community plays an important role in a destination’s image and residents are often an integral part of the tourism experience Residents who support the tourism industry tend to be friendlier, providing a more positive experience for the tourists, which affect intentions to revisit and word-of-mouth recommendations Numerous studies have examined the community factor as part of the overall tourism experience (Fick and Ritchie, 1991; LeBlanc, 1992; Mo et al., 1993; Perdue et al., 1999; Murphy et al., 2000) Several factors help ensure a successful tourism industry, such as the goodwill of local residents, residents’ support of tourism and the successful operation of tourist-oriented businesses and organizations (Jurowski, 1994) These positive and negative effects may influence host residents’ perceived quality of life If the negative effects outweigh the positive effects, the host’s displeasure may eventually be openly displayed to tourists, which is harmful for the destination’s image and ability to attract visitors (Fridgen, 1991) Gursoy et al (2002) argued that ‘the success of any tourism project is threatened to the extent that the development is planned and constructed without the knowledge and support of the host population’ (p 80) To this end, understanding factors that influence residents’ quality of life is essential in achieving the goal of favourable support for tourism development Spatial distribution is one factor suspected to play a role in determining the relationship between tourism development, tourism impacts, and resident attitudes and residents’ quality of life (Harrill and Potts, 2003; Raymond and Brown, 2007) The CP Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd C Chancellor, C.-P S Yu and S T Cole model provides a conceptual framework to investigate the role that the spatial factor may play in determining residents’ quality of life Core–periphery concept Tourism impact literature indicates that the spatial factor (the relationship between residents’ home and the tourism development area) influences residents’ attitudes towards tourism development (Belisle and Hoy, 1980; Lankford and Howard, 1994; Korỗa, 1998; Jurowski and Gursoy, 2004) Earlier research revealed that residents living close to attractions had favourable attitudes towards tourism (Belisle and Hoy, 1980; Pearce, 1980; Sheldon and Var, 1984; Mansfeld, 1992) However, more recent research indicates that residents living close to the core of tourism development may have more negative attitudes towards the effects of tourism (Harrill, 2004; Williams and Lawson, 2001; Harrill and Potts, 2003; Jurowski and Gursoy, 2004) Although perhaps contradictory, there are several studies investigating the spatial factor’s role in determining residents’ attitudes towards tourism development However, there are limited empirical investigations of spatial factors relation to residents’ quality of life The CP concept has been used to systematically understand and develop economic systems geographically (Myrdal, 1957; Hirschmann, 1958; Friedmann, 1966; cited in Murphy and Andressen, 1988), while providing context and explanation for power and development differences between cities, countries and hemispheres (Friedmann, 1966; Frank, 1969; Ibbery, 1984; cited in Weaver, 1998) Core areas are generally considered more urban and contain the majority of economic, political and social clout for a defined geographic region Periphery areas are typically rural and to some degree dependent upon the core while providing natural resources and labour to support the core (Hughes and Holland, 1994) The CP has been explored in a variety of geographic contexts from global (Krugman and Venables, 1995), to single country (Moore, 1984; Jordon, 2007), to single US state (Hughes and Holland, 1994), to a small region within a Canadian province (Murphy and Andressen, 1988) Int J Tourism Res 13, 496–507 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr Exploring Quality of Life Perceptions Delineating the core versus periphery has traditionally been based on distance and location with an emphasis on the periphery’s isolation from the core (Prideaux, 2002, p 308) However, Prideaux (2002) suggests that defining the periphery as simply distance from the core is now challenged due to transportation technology and its effect on people’s perception of distance and time Orange County’s tourism is primarily concentrated in two adjoining communities, and given Prideaux’s (2002) assertions, this study operationalized core versus periphery based on the presence (core) or absence (periphery) of tourism development PURPOSE OF THE STUDY Although many studies investigate resident attitudes towards tourism development, there is a dearth of literature exploring tourism development and residents’ quality of life (Allen, 1990; Andereck et al., 2007) Additionally, authors suggest that the spatial factor moderates tourism’s impacts on residents’ quality of life; however, few studies have empirically addressed this issue (Harrill and Potts, 2003) The purpose of this study was to better understand the relationship between tourism development and residents’ quality of life, using the CP model as a conceptual framework Specifically, this study sought to determine if residents’ quality of life varied depending upon if the respondent lived in the core or a periphery location This study also sought to determine the quality of life variables that contribute to one’s overall measure of quality of life Specifically, this study aims to: (i) examine resident quality of life elements that are affected by tourism development across core and periphery areas and (ii) test how the quality of life elements affect resident overall quality of life in core and periphery areas Figure illustrates this research framework METHOD Study community Located in South Central Indiana, Orange County is relatively easily accessible for residents from many sizable Midwestern markets Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 499 Positive and negative perceived impacts of Tourism development A Spatial factor Resident quality of life by element B Resident overall quality of life experience Figure Research framework (Figure 2) In recent history, basic manufacturing has been the primary industry (Orange County Economic Development Partnership, 2009) The average earning per job in Orange County for 2006 was 23.7% lower than the state average (STATS Indiana, 2009) Tourism is re-emerging in this rural county and is expected to diversify and stimulate the local economy as it did early in the 20th century when Orange County was a prominent regional destination Orange County’s traditional attractions were scenic, hilly topography and a resort built around a natural hot spring considered to contain medicinal properties Tourism began to decline significantly in the 1940s and for many years played a much smaller role in the local economy Once the Indiana state government approved a casino license for the county, tourism development began in earnest, and the original resort was refurbished into a four-star accommodation with adjoining casino, which opened in November 2006 Shortly afterwards, a five-star accommodation opened, as did golf courses planned by a prominent course designer, an indoor/outdoor water park, several other smaller attractions, other new lodgings and upscale shopping venues These new and refurbished attractions Int J Tourism Res 13, 496–507 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr 500 C Chancellor, C.-P S Yu and S T Cole Figure Orange County, Indiana, USA Table Annual statistics of employment, earnings and average earnings of accommodations and food sector in Orange County, Indiana Employment Annual earnings Average earnings per job 2006 2007 2008 950 22 231 000 23 401 2044 59 620 000 29 168 2023 61 498 000 30 399 STATS Indiana (2008) joined the more modest offerings of lakes, a ski slope, shopping, museums and antiques As indicated in Table 1, recent tourism development has provided economic growth to Orange County Tourism-related employment grew from 950 to 2044 individuals between 2006 and 2007, which coincided with the opening of upscale tourism attractions Data from STATS Indiana (2008) indicated that Orange County’s average earning per job for accommodations and food service sector ranked #1 in the state Recent tourism development in Orange County has been focused in the adjacent towns of French Lick and West Baden Springs, which represented 12.9% of the county’s 2006 population (STATS Indiana, 2009) The upscale and midrange accommodations, waterpark, resort, casino, golf courses and shopping venues were Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd developed in French Lick and West Baden Springs, which determined the selection of these two towns as the core in this study The periphery is compromised of all the surrounding communities, which received very little or no recent tourism development Figure is a map of the rather rectangular Orange County with its four communities large enough to have local governments Communities containing no local governments were not included but are dispersed throughout the county Data collection Survey instruments were mailed to a random selection of 2000 households in Orange County, Indiana The household addresses were purchased from a marketing firm Using a modified Dillman (2000) Tailored Design technique, Int J Tourism Res 13, 496–507 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr Exploring Quality of Life Perceptions 501 Figure Core and periphery areas of Orange County* *Only communities large enough to support a local government were included each respondent was contacted five times (prenotice postcard, letter/questionnaire, reminder postcard, replacement letter/questionnaire and reminder postcard) In addition to the quality of life questions, information was also gathered on residents’ demographics ZIP code data were used to categorize respondents into either the core (French Lick, West Baden Springs) or periphery (all other locations) from crime, conditions of roads and highways, infrastructure, traffic congestion, parks and recreation areas, overall cleanliness and appearance, and overall community livability (Wilkin, 2006) Additionally, a subjective overall quality of life question was asked using the same five-point scale Data management and analysis Survey instrument Quality of life was measured in subjective dimensions, which reflected residents’ life satisfaction, happiness, feelings of well-being and beliefs about their standard of living According to Dissart and Deller (2000), subjective measures are critical to accurately evaluate community quality of life Thus, the concept of subjective dimension was adopted in this study to measure residents’ quality of life This study used a five-point scale (1 = Very Poor, = Poor, = Fair, = Good, = Very Good) to measure resident perceptions on 12 quality of life items, including emergency services, museums and cultural centres, job opportunities, educational system, cost of living, safety Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd Data were stored and analysed using the SPSS 16.0 (IBM Corporation, Somers, NY, USA) software package Analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to determine if differences existed between core and periphery respondents on each of the quality of life dimensions and the overall quality of life question Regression analysis was then used to determine which dimensions contributed to the quality of life for respondents in each group RESULTS AND DISCUSSION There were 649 usable survey instruments returned, for a response rate of 32.5% Among the respondents, 55.8% were male, and 23.8% Int J Tourism Res 13, 496–507 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr 502 C Chancellor, C.-P S Yu and S T Cole were between 56 and 65 years Additionally, 50% were employed full time and 32.2% reported a household income between $20 000 and $39 000 annually The overall quality of life mean for all respondents was 3.71, very near the equivalent of ‘good’ The results of respondents’ ratings of quality of life elements are illustrated in Table The lowest rated elements, job opportunities, museums and cultural centres, and the conditions of roads and highways, were considered ‘poor to fair’ The highest rated elements approached a ‘good’ rating and included the educational system, emergency services and safety from crime The periphery group reported a statistically significant (p < 0.05) higher overall quality of life score (3.78) than the core group (3.56), which supports the idea that those living in the core might be experiencing negative impacts from tourism Further analysis using a t-test found several significant differences (p < 0.05) between the core and periphery groups as illustrated in Table The core group reported lower quality of life scores on seven of the eight significant variables Specifically, the core group reported lower quality of life scores on the variables safety from crime, traffic congestion, overall community livability, cost of living, overall cleanliness and appearance These are common issues associated with negative effects of tourism, which may indicate the core group’s quality of life was being negatively affected by tourism For example and increase in crime, traffic congestion, cost of living and litter are all possible negative impacts of tourism development (Akis et al., 1996) Job opportunities was the only significant (p < 0.05) variable rated higher by the core group This is not surprising since tourism Table Rating of the current condition of each of the following quality of life elements in Orange County Very poor Poor Fair Good Very good 12 (1.9) (1.3) 10 (1.6) 14 (2.2) 27 (4.2) 35 (5.4) 41 (6.3) 57 (8.9) 35 (5.5) 67 (10.4) 187 (29.4) 143 (22.3) 40 (6.2) 27 (4.2) 26 (4.1) 40 (6.2) 75 (11.7) 71 (11.0) 68 (10.5) 156 (24.3) 131 (20.4) 136 (21.2) 233 (36.6) 246 (38.4) 193 (30.0) 200 (31.3) 177 (27.6) 249 (38.8) 255 (39.8) 241 (37.4) 265 (41.0) 208 (32.4) 294 (45.9) 266 (41.4) 102 (16.0) 180 (28.1) 258 (40.1) 294 (45.9) 328 (51.2) 276 (43.1) 213 (33.3) 231 (35.9) 198 (30.6) 166 (25.9) 153 (23.9) 161 (25.1) 34 (5.3) 43 (6.7) Variable Educational system Emergency services (e.g police, fire) Safety from crime Overall community livability Infrastructure (water, sewer, etc.) Traffic congestion Cost of living Parks and recreation areas Overall cleanliness and appearance Conditions of roads and highways Museums and cultural centres Job opportunities 117 (18.2) 91 (14.2) 94 (14.7) 54 (8.4) 24 (3.8) 54 (8.4) 67 (10.4) 47 (7.3) 27 (4.2) 12 (1.9) (0.9) (1.1) Mean 3.78 3.77 3.76 3.53 3.42 3.36 3.31 3.02 3.01 2.87 2.46 2.34 All numbers in parentheses represent percent Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd Int J Tourism Res 13, 496–507 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr Exploring Quality of Life Perceptions 503 Table Means of the 12 quality of life elements in core–periphery model Variable Educational system Safety from crime Traffic congestion Overall community livability Cost of living Overall cleanliness and appearance Conditions of roads and highways Job opportunities Emergency services Museums and cultural centres Infrastructure (water, sewer, etc.) Parks and recreation Core mean Periphery mean Significancea 3.42 3.60 3.10 3.23 3.08 2.80 2.74 2.59 3.76 2.35 3.49 2.95 3.95 3.84 3.48 3.67 3.42 3.11 2.93 2.23 3.77 2.51 3.39 3.05 0.000 0.001 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.020 0.000 — — — — For significant items, the bold values represent higher means a Only significant items have p-value listed development increases job opportunities; however, this data indicates that job opportunities might be the only positive result of tourism development for core respondents In order to better understand the relationship between the 12 quality of life items and the overall quality of life score, regression analysis was conducted for all residents and then separately for the core and periphery groups For all residents, analysis revealed an R2 of 0.376 with the significant contributing variables being emergency services, job opportunities, cost of living, overall community livability, educational system and parks and recreation (Table 4) Respondents living in the core indicated that emergency services, job opportunities, cost of living, overall community livability and infrastructure elements were significant contributors to their overall quality of life with an R2 of 0.384 Respondents living in the periphery indicated that emergency services, job opportunities, cost of living, educational system and infrastructure made significant contributions to their overall quality of life with an R2 of 0.412 All significant standardized coefficients were positive except for the variable infrastructure in the core group Only the four variables of emergency services, job opportunities, cost of living and infrastructure were significant (p < 0.05) to both the core and periphery respondents Job opportunities and cost of living are basic concerns, and their significance might stem from the fact that Orange County has been economically depressed for Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd several years Therefore, it is intuitive that job opportunities and cost of living would be important predictors of quality of life in this area Emergency services and infrastructure (water and sewer) are also basic needs Residents of more affluent and developed areas may take these issues for granted Additionally, these variables have fewer substitutes, which could make them more significant predictors The variables parks and recreation services and museums and cultural centres did not significantly affect quality of life The lack of significance could be due to the fact that rural Orange County does not have an abundance of recreation services, museums and cultural centres Alternatively, perhaps the benefits derived from these variables are being met through other mediums, which could be an indication that these variables have more substitutes in the area The variable educational system is interesting in that it only significantly contributed to the overall quality of life within the periphery group and was the most highly rated quality of life variable (3.95) by the periphery group Infrastructure is significant in the core and periphery but not once combined in the all group due to differences in how each group rated infrastructure In the core group, the standardized coefficient for infrastructure was negative (−0.228), indicating that an increase in infrastructure negatively affected the respondents’ evaluation of quality of life For context, Int J Tourism Res 13, 496–507 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr 504 C Chancellor, C.-P S Yu and S T Cole Table Elements affecting the overall quality of life measurement using regression analysis Respondents All Core Periphery Independent variables p-values Standardized coefficients p-values Standardized coefficients p-values Standardized coefficients Emergency services Job opportunities Cost of living Overall community Livability Educational system Parks and recreation Infrastructure (water, sewer, etc.) Museums and cultural Centers Safety from crime Conditions of roads and highways Traffic congestion Overall cleanliness and appearance R2 0.002* 0.000* 0.000* 0.001* 0.12 0.151 0.211 0.156 0.019* 0.003* 0.001* 0.001* 0.158 0.206 0.245 0.297 0.035* 0.001* 0.000* 0.057 0.101 0.156 0.190 0.105 0.002* 0.016* 0.858 0.118 0.096 0.007 0.280 0.099 0.001* 0.077 0.114 −0.228 0.001* 0.062 0.036* 0.147 0.092 0.097 0.307 −0.038 0.341 −0.064 0.604 −0.024 0.253 0.305 0.047 0.042 0.845 0.307 −0.015 0.074 0.100 0.574 0.08 0.027 0.756 0.356 0.012 0.041 0.907 0.887 0.008 0.011 0.652 0.708 0.02 0.021 0.376 0.384 0.412 * p < 0.05 Note: Dependent variable is overall quality of life significant road, water and sewer construction took place in the core areas before and during data collection, which might have skewed the data and points to the necessity of conducting longitudinal studies to account for the dynamic nature of tourism development Conversely, the periphery group had a positive standardized coefficient (0.097) indicating that an increase in infrastructure positively affected the respondents’ evaluation of qualify of life CONCLUSION AND FUTURE RESEARCH Tourism is a re-emerging industry in Orange County, and tourism officials have taken action to ensure that the entire county will benefit economically, based on the idea that economic benefits will lead to a higher quality of life However, this study indicates that there are factors other than economics to consider To this end, understanding tourism’s role from the residents’ perspective can aid tourism officials in policy and decision-making FurtherCopyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd more, the CP approach provides a systematic method of detecting and understanding the diversity of residents’ perceptions of their quality of life This project contributes to the literature by providing empirical evidence associating quality of life factors to the CP model The idea that residents’ quality of life may be affected, whether or not the resident lives in an area of tourism development, was supported by this study The periphery group reported a statistically significant higher overall quality of life score than the core group The core group reported lower scores on seven individual quality of life variables, and those variables are common indicators of negative tourism impacts The one variable, job opportunities, which core respondents rated significantly higher than periphery respondents is a common indicator of a positive economic impact of tourism Therefore, these findings indicate that tourism development may be contributing to the difference in quality of life scores for the Int J Tourism Res 13, 496–507 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr Exploring Quality of Life Perceptions Orange County respondents, and that the CP context (presence or absence of tourism development) might help explain these differences This study does not necessarily suggest that tourism development lowers residents’ quality of life; rather the findings provide another avenue to consider when investigating the spatial distribution of tourism development impacts Focus group inquiry techniques would be beneficial to provide a deeper understanding of these relationships This study also contributes to the identification of variables that contribute to the overall quality of life measurement, and provides rationale and context for those contributions This study operationalized core and periphery as simply the presence or absence of tourism development, in order to try and account for the complexities of the term ‘distance’, which previous studies have encountered (Prideaux, 2002) This study was conducted as the first phase of the upscale tourism development projects were opened, capturing resident perceptions of quality of life before the anticipated large numbers of tourists arrived Locally, this study provides baseline data, which could be useful for future comparisons in a longitudinal study Future iterations of this study would allow tourism officials and researchers to better understand and monitor the patterns of tourism impacts within the CP context Geographical information system technology could be a useful tool for monitoring the dynamic changes of tourism impacts on residents’ quality of life LIMITATIONS This study has used the CP model to illustrate differences in residents’ perceptions of quality of life elements Although this project has answered some questions, it has also raised others that are ripe for exploration These findings support conceptual underpinnings of the CP relationship regarding quality of life; however, more research is needed to better explain the relationship and further quantify the tourism impacts that affect quality of life Additionally, understanding the importance of each factor to each respondent would aid in a better application of the results Perhaps a Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 505 factor may be rated poorly because the particular factor is just not important to the resident, or maybe the factor is not an option in that location For example, most of the periphery locations in this study are very rural and not offer some of the quality of life variables, e.g parks and recreation departments, and museums and cultural centres Lastly, this study was conducted in a very rural area of a developed nation and the findings may be generalizable to similar areas domestically and internationally However, the findings may be less generalizable to urban areas REFERENCES Akis S, Peristianis N, Warner J 1996 Residents’ attitudes to tourism development: the case of Cyprus Tourism Management 17(7): 481–494 Allen LR 1990 Benefits of leisure attributes to community satisfaction Journal of Leisure Research 22: 183–196 Allen LR, Hafer HR, Long PT, Perdue RR 1993 Rural residents’ attitudes toward recreation and tourism development Journal of Travel Research 31(4): 27–33 Andereck KL, Jurowski C 2006 Tourism and quality of 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in ButteSilver Bow: Visitor Profiles and Resident Attitudes (University of Montana Institute for Tourism and Recreation Research Report 2006-2) Available at http://www.itrr.umt.edu/research06/ ButteCTAP06.pdf (accessed January 2009) Williams J, Lawson R 2001 Community issues and resident opinions of tourism Annals of Tourism Research 28: 269–290 Int J Tourism Res 13, 496–507 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF TOURISM RESEARCH Int J Tourism Res 13, 508 – 510 (2011) Published online 19 July 2011 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/jtr.863 Conference Report The Cruise Industry: the Other Side of Growth, The Third International Cruise Conference, Dubrovnik, Croatia 16–18 May 2011 Alexis Papathanassis Institute for Maritime Tourism, Bremerhaven University of Applied Sciences, Bremerhaven, Germany Received 26 May 2011; Accepted 01 June 2011 Keywords: Cruise; Conference; Report he Third International Cruise Conference was held over three days in Dubrovnik in May 2011 Compared with the tourism sector as a whole, cruise tourism has experienced significant growth over the recent years The optimism aside, little has been done to address the externalities and overreaching social impacts accompanying this growth Overcrowded destinations, environmental degradation, tourism income leakages, labour exploitation and criminality are just examples of growth‐related issues Held in the port of Dubrovnik, this conference followed the tradition and accent of the previous two conferences in Bremerhaven (Germany) and Plymouth (UK), encouraging open discussions between academics and professionals, while maintaining a holistic and T *Correspondence to: Alexis Papathanassis, Institute for Maritime Tourism, Bremerhaven University of Applied Sciences, Bremerhaven, Germany critical focus Among a total of approximately 50 delegates, a variety of cruise sector stakeholders was represented, including the Croatian Ministry of Tourism, the Dubrovnik Port and Marina Authorities, international research organisations and educators Post‐graduate students also were encouraged to attend by presenting full papers and participating in the open discussions with the various experts Each conference day ended with a social activity programme, including a guided tour to the Dubrovnik port and dinner on board the event boat ‘Sea Star’ Those events supported the creation of an informal atmosphere, which in turn enabled intense and controversial discussions during the conference tracks Based on the organizers’ experience from the previous conference, sessions were held successively (i.e no parallel sessions) as to avoid ‘over‐dispersal’ of the audience The conference tracks were organized under the following headings: Marina tourism and management, cruise product development, cruise supply chain and infrastructure, sustainability and security and advances in cruise research The enveloping discussion could be encapsulated under the headings of: Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd Conference Report • Sustainable port development and socio‐ economic impacts of cruise tourism: The emergence of mega‐cruisers and the increasing popularity of Mediterranean ports in cruise itineraries are posing significant pressures on port infrastructures and driving destination carrying capacities over their limits The port of Dubrovnik exemplifies those issues, often having four large cruises docking the same day A congested old town, sea life deterioration, high prices and the over‐ commercialisation of the city are just examples of the challenges facing this port of call The indirect costs of dealing with such issues render the economic benefits of investing in the development of cruise tourism questionable The required investments inevitably call for public–private partnerships and for close co‐operation between cruise operators and ports This raises a number of questions regarding vertical dependencies in the cruise supply chain, economic and environmental risks, seasonality management and ‘co‐opetition’ between neighbouring ports • The emergence of ‘Land–Sea’ holidays: Beyond contemporary cruise tourism, there are a number of maritime‐related forms of tourism emerging Lighthouse, marina and icebreaker tourism are examples of emerging land–sea types of holiday offers co‐existing with and growing alongside with cruising Despite the marketing and distribution challenges facing such offers, they also enable diversification and additional tourism income for maritime destinations/ports This poses a viable solution for dealing with the seasonality of cruise tourism, while reducing dependency on a single form of tourism, thus contributing to a longer‐term economic sustainability for destinations • Social issues and cruises: Although cruise tourism is primarily perceived as an economic/business phenomenon, its socio‐ psychological aspects cannot be ignored Cruise guests and their experiences not occur in a vacuum Passengers socially interact, not only with one another but also with the vessels’ personnel and the locals at the destinations Perceiving the growth and popularity of cruising as a modern social phenomenon and understanding its dynamics are essential for interpreting and dealing Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 509 with a number of challenges currently facing the sector A number of ethical questions are raised for cruise operators when dealing with issues such as cultural diversity, living conditions and criminality (e.g sexual assaults) on board Moreover, there are practical questions concerning guest segmentation, social engineering on board, security regulations and facility management and their indirect impacts on the cruise experience and guests’ satisfaction • Cruise research and education: Over the last years, the increase of published cruise research has been proportional to the sector’s growth Nevertheless, it is still characterized as pre‐paradigmatic and fragmented Alternatively stated, there is still a lack of unifying paradigms and theories shedding light in the cruise phenomena It is worth stating that a significant number of quantitative papers are based on narrow sampling frames (i.e respondents selected from a single cruise, company and/or destination) and have a descriptive focus, suggesting that they are by‐products of company‐financed, market‐research projects Issues of research data availability/ access and validity, as well as the absence of domain‐specific methodological approaches, contribute to this state of affairs Within this context, and with the possibilities offered by online data mining, the Internet has been identified as a promising source of research data The challenges pertaining to cruise research are parallel to those facing cruise‐ management education Dealing with a variety of undergraduate applicant expectations and the multiplicity of career paths in the cruise sector presents a challenge for the development of university curricula and course management In conjunction with a pre‐paradigmatic cruise research, this gives rise to the so‐called ‘circumstantial curriculum’, its purpose being a matter of individual interpretation The aforementioned can be translated to a number of significant and relevant questions for the academic community The conceptual scope of the cruise sector and the corresponding research domain could be extended to include the interface with the ports of call and the relationships with maritime tourism Int J Tourism Res 13, 508 – 510 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr 510 offers in general At a theoretical level, the business, economic and environmental focus needs to be complemented by sociological and psychological theories to support a more holistic understanding of cruise‐related phenomena Empirical cruise research could benefit from the exploration, application and adaptation of novel methodological approaches; especially those utilising online content, as those could help with bypassing data availability restrictions Finally, a close co‐operation with industry practitioners and their integration into cruise education would ease the transition from a ‘circumstantial’ to a ‘consequential’ cruise curriculum, creating an ongoing and explicit connection between theory and practice The gradual development of an educational standard, serving as a point of reference for individual expectations (and aspirations), is arguably beneficial for university educators, undergraduate applicants, and their future employers Concluding, it could be stated that the conference produced more questions and issues than those it attempted to answer Bringing together a rather small but nonetheless diverse Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd Conference Report and committed number of participants has proven useful for the further development of an international cruise research agenda, driven and supported by the Cruise Research Society, e.V non‐profit organisation aiming at bringing together an international, dispersed group of cruise academics and practitioners The organizer, Prof Tihomir Lukovic, said: ‘I believe that we had very interesting papers that have deepened our thinking about the cruise industry and have shown us the possibilities of expanding our research activities whilst developing maritime tourism’ The fourth International Cruise Conference will be held in Leeuwarden in the Netherlands If you would like to know more about the Cruise Research Society, please visit http://www cruiseresearchsociety.com Contact Prof Tihomir Lukovic at the University of Dubrovnik (Tel: +00385 98 343 899), Email: tlukovic@unidu hr, to find out more about the Third International Cruise Conference, or contact Ate de Groot at the Stenden University for details about the forthcoming Fourth International Cruise Conference, Email: ate.de.groot@stenden.com Int J Tourism Res 13, 508 – 510 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/jtr